Gas supplies to parts of Chechnya's capital Grozny have been cut off after an accident damaged a gas pipeline running through the Russian region. The accident came shortly before its energy-starved neighbour Georgia agreed a deal with Iran to get extra gas. Most of Georgia still lacks power and heating after snow and wind knocked down its main power line and explosions ruptured a key Russian gas pipeline. Russia and its neighbours are suffering from extreme cold this winter. In Chechnya, the emergency situations ministry and gas utillity experts are searching for the cause of the pipeline rupture, which happened near the city of Gudermes, a ministry official said. The rupture cut off supplies to the Shali and Kurchaloi districts as well as to the capital. ... http://news.bbc.co.uk

Senate GOP leaders plan to confirm Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito early next week. Some Democrats continued trying to build support for a filibuster, but there appeared to be little momentum for it. A final vote making the New Jersey jurist the nation's 110th Supreme Court justice was scheduled for Tuesday morning, only hours before President Bush begins his State of the Union address to Congress and the nation, if Alito's bipartisan supporters succeed in rounding up 60 votes to cut off debate on Monday. Republicans didn't seem worried, with 52 of their 55-member majority and three Democrats — Robert Byrd of West Virginia, Tim Johnson of South Dakota and Ben Nelson of Nebraska — already publicly supporting Alito's confirmation as replacement for retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. ...http://www.cbsnews.com/images/2006/01/13/image1206749g.jpg

The Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, indicated today that he would ask the militant group Hamas to form a government following its victory in Wednesday's elections.Speaking outside his office, Mr Abbas said he was in talks with the parties over the formation of a new government after Hamas secured 76 seats in the 132-member Palestinian parliament to break the 40-year hold of the Fatah party on Palestinian leadership."Until now, we haven't asked anyone to form the government," Mr Abbas said. "We are carrying on contacts with all factions, and of course we will ask the party that won the majority to form the government."The Hamas leader in the new parliament, Ismail Haniyeh, told worshippers at a mosque in a Gaza refugee camp that he had spoken to Mr Abbas earlier this morning and requested a meeting within 48 hours to work out the shape of the new government....http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,1696482,00.html

Georgia's president said Friday that Iran had agreed to start providing emergency gas supplies to the Caucasus mountain nation as early as this weekend, signaling an end to an energy crisis made worse by an extreme cold snap. Russia, meanwhile, was close to completing repairs on a gas pipeline that would allow it to resume gas deliveries later Friday, an official said. The electric utility in the capital of Tbilisi was providing 110 megawatts of electricity, while Azerbaijan was sending in 50 megawatts, Turkey 60 megawatts and Russia 65 megawatts. Still, Georgia needed 600 megawatts more to ensure a normal supply, the Georgian State Electric System said....http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=1548204

Palestinian voters availed themselves of the time- honored democratic right to "throw the bums out" in their first legislative elections in a decade Wednesday exactly the kind of action implicit in President Bush's push for democracy in the Middle East. But by snubbing the Fatah Party of US-supported Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in favor of the radical Islamist group Hamas, Palestinians also put the Bush administration in a difficult spot. The US might now seem hypocritical to many Arabs - encouraging democracy in the Middle East, while rejecting the choices that result from its exercise. At the same time, questions mount over whether Mr. Bush's campaign for democracy is encouraging the empowerment of Islamist militants across the region. "This [election result] is really going to scare ... other governments in the region, and the Egyptians in particular are going to tell the US, 'We told you so,' ...http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0127/p01s01-usfp.html

The American military said Thursday that it had released half the Iraqi women held in its prisons, but it said the release had been previously scheduled and was unrelated to demands made by the kidnappers of the American journalist Jill Carroll.The military freed 5 of the 10 Iraqi women in its custody late Thursday afternoon as part of a regular prisoner release that included more than 400 Iraqis, said Lt. Col. Barry Johnson, a military spokesman. The release drew attention because advance news of it came after Ms. Carroll's captors made their demands last week, saying in a videotape that they would kill her if the United States did not release all Iraqi women from its jails in 72 hours. But the military said the review of the Iraqi prisoners' cases came long before the kidnappers set their deadline, which expired last Friday. "We do not negotiate or bend to demands of terrorists," Colonel Johnson said....http://fairuse.100webcustomers.com/fairenough/nyt012.html